ANNiiX 

11B 
076 


THE  NUMBERING  OF  THE  PEOPLE 

THE  CONGREGATION'S  PARAMOUNT  DUTY 


Sermon  preached  in  the  Spanish  and 
Portuguese  Synagogue  Shearith  Israel, 
Central  Park  West  and  Seventieth  St., 
New  York  City,  on  Sabbath  Ki  Tissa, 
20  Adar,  5672,  9  March,  1912. 


BY 


The  REV.  DR.  D.  DE  SOLA  POOL 

Acting  Minister  of  the 

Congregation 


The  Numbering  of  the  People 

THE  CONGREGATION'S  PARAMOUNT  DUTY 

"Everyone  who  passes  among  those  numbered  from  twenty  years  old 
and  upward  shall  give  his  tribute  to  the  Lord."     Exodus,  XXX,   14. 


The  opening  verses  of  this  week's  Parasha,  from  which  our 
text  is  taken,  give  directions  in  what  spirit  the  census  of  the  people 
should  be  taken.  We  read1  that  when  king  David  numbered  the 
people,  his  sturdy  general,  Joab,  protested  against  the  action  which 
he  knew  to  be  a  sin,  ''and  David's  heart  smote  him  after  that  he  had 
numbered  the  people.  And  David  said  unto  the  Lord  I  have 
sinned  greatly  in  that  I  have  done."  For,  say  the  Rabbis,2 
king  David  did  wrong  in  that  he  did  not  ask  from  the  people  the 
tribute  for  the  Lord  demanded  by  our  text.  He  counted  his  people 
in  pride  of  heart  to  know  how  many  were  able  to  offer  tribute  and 
service  to  him,  the  earthly  king,  without  the  thought  of  counting 
those  able  to  offer  tribute  and  service  to  the  Lord,  the  King  of 
kings. 

Ever  and  anon  a  synagogue  finds  it  needful  to  take  a  census 
of  its  members;  this  morning,  let  us  of  this  congregation  number 
the  men  of  twenty  years  old  and  upward  who,  following  the  teach- 
ings of  the  text,  give  tribute  and  service  to  the  Lord. 

One  by  one  the  older  members  who  stood  in  the  front  rank 
of  those  willing  to  offer  service  to  the  Lord  are  being  taken  from 
us.  Are  their  survivors  stepping  forward  to  fill  the  gaps  in  the 
ranks?  As  year  by  year  we  lose  those  whose  training  in  Hebrew 
and  whose  knowledge  of  Judaism  fitted  them  to  offer  Jewish  serv- 
ice to  the  Lord,  it  becomes  ever  more  manifest  that  too  often  their 
place  is  not  being  filled  and  cannot  be  filled  by  the  younger  gen- 
eration. In  common  with  every  other  synagogue  in  this  country, 
we  find  that  the  men  of  to-day  of  twenty  years  and  upwards  are 
neither  equipped  with  knowledge  nor  disciplined  by  youthful 
training  to  offer  the  same  Jewish  service  to  the  Ix)rd  as  did  those 
who  are  passing  from  us.  We  cast  our  eyes  over  the  synagogue 
benches  and  ask  where  are  the  young  men  of  twenty  years  old 
and  upwards?  It  is  true  that  their  names  figure  on  the  congre- 


&117526 


gational  membership  list ;  but  on  the  Sabbath,  the  weekly  day  of 
muster  for  the  Jewish  people,  should  not  everyone  on  that  list  be 
here  in  his  appointed  place  to  attest  his  loyalty  to  his  people  and 
his  God?  No  one  claiming  for  himself  the  title  of  Jew  may  be 
exempted  from  this  weekly  offering  of  service  to  the  Lord ;  and 
if  in  singular  obliquity  we  are  content  to  number  the  people  by 
the  list  without  demanding  from  them  the  prescribed  tribute  of 
service  for  God,  shall  there  not  fall  upon  us  the  stroke  of  the 
Lord  that  smote  king  David  and  his  people  when  mere  numbers 
were  paraded  without  the  offering  of  service  to  the  Lord? 

But  we  do  not  despair  of  our  future.  Time  and  time  again 
we  have  taken  comfort  and  hope  from  the  name  of  the  Synagogue 
b  K  1  B»  '  n  »  1  K  B>  "the  remnant  of  Israel."  All  history  tells 
us  that  the  masses  of  Israel  have  always  been  lost — ten  tribes  out 
of  twelve  were  lost  in  one  gigantic  upheaval ;  but  all  history  tells 
us  that  the  remnant  of  Israel  must  always  live.  The  paralysis  of 
indifference,  the  treachery  of  intermarriage,  the  suicide  of  assimila- 
tion may  wreak  their  havoc  upon  some  of  our  members ;  but  God 
works  with  the  faithful  remnant  that  refuses  to  be  swept  by  the 
whirling  stream  of  religious  assimilation  into  the  irresistible  vortex 
of  absorption.  We  put  not  our  trust  in  numbers,  we  look  for  salva- 
tion from  the  faithful  few,  the  b  K  "I  B> '  n  "  n  K  e>  the  remnant 
of  Israel  over  which  the  prophet  rejoiced.3  Therefore  we  face  the 
future  serenely,  knowing  that  with  God's  blessing  there  will  always 
be  a  faithful  remnant  of  those  who  have  gone  before,  to  carry  on 
our  treasured  tradition.  Does  it  seem  sad  that  the  future  is  pledged 
to  a  remnant,  and  only  a  remnant?  Such  is  God's  universal  way 
of  working  throughout  all  nature.  Of  the  many  seeds  sown  but 
few  come  to  fruition ;  and  no  synagogue  may  hope  to  gather  fruit 
/from  all  the  seeds  it  plants. 

A  reading  of  the  history  of  this  or  of  any  other  historic  con- 
gregation evinces  the  same  law  of  the  survival  of  only  a  chosen 
remnant,  and  reveals  to  us  a  continuous  infiltration  of  new  forces 
to  maintain  the  congregation.  The  personnel  of  every  congregation 
inevitably  changes  with  time's  relentless  flow.  As  we  number  the 
congregation  to-day,  how  many  can  we  count  bearing  the  honored 
name  of  Judah,  Gomez,  Hart,  Hays  or  Seixas — families  once  so 
numerous  in  this  synagogue  ?  Families  become  scattered ;  time's 
irresistible  democracy  brings  low  those  who  sit  in  high  places  and 
raises  the  lowly,  and  nature  inexorably  decrees  that  human  stock 
must  die  out  unless  it  be  rejuvenated  by  an  infusion  of  new  blood. 


Therefore,  as  we  number  the  congregation  and  lament  that  the 
young  do  not  always  take  the  place  of  the  old  trusted  warriors  who 
are  taken  from  us,  shall  we  not  aver  that  no  congregation  can  live 
wholly  on  its  inherited  forces?  Every  historic  community  needs 
accretions  from  without  if  it  is  to  endure  in  vigor.  Throughout  the 
two  hundred  and  fifty  years  of  our  existence  as  a  congregation,  the 
requisite  rejuvenation  has  been  infused  into  us  in  every  generation 
by  the  coming  of  a  new  member  here,  a  fresh  family  there,  and  from 
time  to  time  even  of  a  small  immigrating  band  of  families.  But  at 
this  moment  there  is  presented  to  the  congregation  a  more  wonder- 
ful opportunity  of  gathering  into  its  ranks  new  warriors  to  serve  in 
God's  cause  than  it  has  known  ever  before.  For  there  have  come 
thronging  to  our  doors  ten  thousand  of  our  nearest  kin,  able  and 
willing  to  offer  the  same  service  to  the  Lord  as  the  founders  of  this 
congregation  gave.  We  dare  no  longer  rest  supine  on  the  decaying 
merit  of  past  achievement.  We  shall  be  culpably  false  to  our  duty 
if  we  sit  inertly  dreaming  of  our  past  or  passing  warriors,  if  we  num- 
ber our  people  by  the  nominal  membership  list,  while  ten  thousand 
of  these,  our  own  closest  brethren,  have  come  to  our  doors  awaiting 
a  word  of  welcome .  It  is  true  that  we  welcome  anyone  and  every- 
one who  comes  to  us  prepared  to  serve  God  with  our  ancient  tradi- 
tional forms  of  service.  But  before  all  we  should  welcome  those 
of  our  brethren,  be  they  poor  as  Hillel  or  of  as  lowly  birth  as  the 
prophet  Amos,  whose  ritual  is  our  own,  whose  Hebrew  accent  is  our 
own,  whose  traditions  are  our  own,  and  whose  ancestry  and  his- 
tory are  our  own. 

It  is  the  most  urgent  and  imperative  duty  of  our  congregation 
to-day  not  to  stand  passively  aloof  awaiting  their  coming  to  us,  but 
to  go  out  to  them  offering  a  friendly,  helping  hand  of  welcome.  For 
our  own  future  as  a  congregation  and  for  their  future  as  faithful 
servitors  of  God  in  this  land  of  unknown  trials,  we  are  obligated 
with  the  sacred  force  of  moral  and  religious  compulsion  to  go  out 
to  them  and  bring  them  to  us  to  unite  together  in  the  service  of  God. 
Some  of  the  active  members  of  our  congregation  are  awakening  to 
this  unique  opportunity  of  swelling  the  ranks  of  those  who  may  be 
counted  as  offering  our  Sephardic  tribute  of  service  to  the  Lord ;  but 
to  the  shame  of  our  men  be  it  said  that  the  realization  of  this  new 
responsibility  has  been  left  largely  to  the  women  of  the  Sisterhood. 

The  religious  organization  of  our  Oriental  kith  and  kin  is  a 
labor  that  calls  immediately  for  the  most  willing  and  energetic 


service  of  the  whole  congregation,  men,  women  and  children.  It 
is  a  work  that  demands  the  tact  born  of  sympathy,  the  self-sacrifice 
born  of  human  love,  and  the  truest  feeling  of  brotherhood  born  of 
love  of  God.  If  this  God-given  opportunity  of  numbering  living 
Jewish  men  and  women  able  to  give  service  to  God,  and  of  no  longer 
counting  by  a  meaningless  list  of  names,  be  neglected  by  the  mem- 
bers of  the  synagogue,  then  woe  for  the  congregation  upon  which 
will  fall  the  stroke  of  God,  as  it  fell  upon  king  David  and  his  people 
when  they  were  numbered  in  pride  without  giving  to  God  the 
tribute  of  service. 

But  if  we  as  a  congregation  undertake  this  work  of  the  religious 
organization  of  these  Oriental  Jews,  then  shall  the  blessing  of  God 
fall  upon  us  as  we  number  no  longer  the  inert  members  on  the  list, 
but  the  living  active  men  of  twenty  years  old  and  upwards  who  are 
able  to  give  their  tribute  of  service  unto  the  Lord.  Then  shall  our 
community  blossom  forth  into  a  new  life  that  shall  be  brilliant  and 
glorious ;  and,  when  we  number  the  people,  there  will  be  fulfilled  in 
us  the  ancient  blessing  :4  "May  the  Lord,  God  of  your  fathers,  add 
to  you  the  like  of  you  a  thousand  times,  and  bless  you  as  he  has 
promised  to  you." 


(')     II.  Sam.  XXIV,  I.  Chron.  XXI. 

(!)     Midrash   Tanhuma,    Ki   Tissa,   9;    Lekach    Tob   to    Exod.    XXX,    12; 
Josephus,  Antiq.  VII,  13,  I. 


(')     Jeremiah  XXXI,  6. 


(4)     Deuteronomy  I,  u. 


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